Hitman: Absolution Director: We Are Struggling To Teach Players Freedom

Hitman: Absolution director, Tore Blystad, believes that the hardest challenge they faced while designing the game was to teach players that they are free to choose how to finish their missions.

“it's quite difficult, actually, to educate players that this is what the game is trying to serve you, because people are increasingly used to games where you're told to do one thing, and if you stray from this line, there will be nothing else around,” he explained.

“It's like, you have this experience, and that's it. So we're telling people, actually, ‘No, no, no. You choose by yourself.’”

Blystad and his team designed the game so that players try different tactics and improvise new ways to fulfill their missions. Essentially, the game changes from player to player, but only “when you understand that you have the choice.”

One of the reasons I never really liked the first Assassin's Creed: not enough Freedom! The potential was there and I was just so used to Hitman. Love that it's still a core value to this series, hopefully the young'ins will learn.

Achievements aren't mandatory unless you have OCD. Also I'm sure there are conflicting achievements such as getting one for a stealthy kill in a mission and getting one for slaughtering everyone in the same mission. Achievements are minor rewards for ingame feats, not guidelines or rules that you must follow.

That's what happens when Half Life, Call of Duty and Halo are praised as 'immersive' and 'ground-breaking' and reviewers bitch about the shooting in Vampire: Bloodlines, Dishonored and Deus Ex. Because playing something your own way is too much work when you're not slaughtering thousands of foreigners.

complete freedom should mean use anything in the game thats not nailed (or so) to the ground in order to finish the objective. just all physics based, combined with tactical or all out guns a blazing. it is doable, they have the proper physics in games that allows it. but everything should be usable. not just select or carefully place items. This isn't a rant, i love Hitman, and soo glad its still going.

It's also doable if you make it sandbox style like the rest of the series and ditch this ridiculously weak narrative. Not to mention maybe make more levels actually hit-focused rather than linear, sneak from a-b throwing bottles at the walls. I've been waiting for this game for 6 years and while some mechanics are definitely better, I can't say I'm much pleased with the end result.